LOVE IN A TIME OF ‘COOTIES’ (VERMONTER OP/ED)

Freedom and unity

My definition of being a Vermonter has always sailed closest to Emerson’s in his exhaustive essay on the subject, SELF-RELIANCE, and one which I took to heart growing up here, to mean: a self-reliant, nonconformist, a hardy individual to whom public opinion is irrelevant, one who is true to self and cause, loyal to neighbors and friends, whose word is true, and whose goodness is inherent in the community and with the earth upon which we all depend to live.

I entertained myself over the decades, with the idea that this State is filled with like-minded hardy, individuals who would help you in a flat second if needed, and otherwise, had the grace to stay out of our lives and spend the rest of their time tending their own pastures, stock and lives. The ‘live and let live-ers,’ ‘take back Vermont-ers,’ and the ‘Vermont Independence-rs’ alike have fueled my imagination and modeled how it is possible to live on this rich and rocky soil of our beloved State. Independence of thought and action can still be found in fells, fens and along ridges throughout the State. And, indeed, in my work as a reporter, I have come in contact with some of the most outspoken of these individuals, who were willing to say out loud what others like them, were thinking.

Presently, I am concerned that this unique sense of the self-reliant individualism, in the context of hundreds of communities throughout the State exampling diverse lifestyles and opinions, are in danger of extinction. This, alongside the crumbling, disappearing, humble family farmsteads that have kept us fed and in good health for generations simply by providing healthy, nutritious food grown from our water and soil — a resource that makes us independent of the outside world — — but which has been slowly and insidiously replaced by feckless fake-farm substitutes, and who, with “…sour faces of the of the multitude, like their sweet faces, have no deep cause, but are put on and off as the wind blows and a newspaper directs.” 

This feckless state of lack of true strength in character, this feckless lack of true courage in the face of forced mandates to conform, of social pressure to comply — one that asks us to abandon one another, to eschew one another for a ‘cootie’s sake,’ — inserts inherent weakness to our characters and our daily lives, and is not of our own choosing. Who or what have we not just opened the door to, and blindly accepted to invited in to sit down at our tables? Beware the wolf in sheep’s clothing.

And who among us will be strong enough to show the wolf the door, in such a weakened, feckless state?

A treachery of images

There is such treachery hidden in the current images of our Vermont world.

We are asked and expected daily to abdicate our wills, to give over the right to choose what is right for us, mandated daily to complacently feed on and share with one another, the stories we are told that justify a blatant loss of choice and liberty, and which the feckless comply with, without a whimper let alone concern over current losses of rights and liberties.

Is this who we are now: feckless Vermonters? Have we lost the integrity that informs us to have courage, grace, resilience and find noncomformist solutions when faced with adversity? Have we lost the thread and now think the bottom of the barrel is the top, and that rolling over and kowtowing to authority is the new ‘courage of a Vermonter?’

United We Stand, Divided We Fall

Its my opinion that censure and social distancing places too many people in an extremely vulnerable spot where they can be hurt very easily. Distancing of any sort, but particularly government mandated, puts a target on the backs of vulnerable people, which some narcissist will exploit, serenade and win them over, through, but who will inevitably burn the vulnerable on their way out, to their next target and victim, to put it nicely. Both the edict and the outcome, always in the name of power: power over.

Thus, if me not buying ‘cootie status’ evokes simmering fear-soaked anger, or gaslighting that serves to guilt me or others into isolation without access to humanity, or makes me feel guilty for both needing humanity’s touch, and connection, I’m not having any of it! This is NOT a world I want to live in.

Using media outlets from Front Porch Forum to news organizations to censor, gaslight and target nonconformists, using unquestioning dupes to evoke punitive shunning, is a blatant attempt to divide us against one another. 

If, asking questions like, ‘who benefits,’ or doing ‘deep dive’ research that predicates a questioning of the premise upon which our ‘freedom and unity’ is being de facto removed as I write, then it is crystal clear to me that this is not a benevolent action nor actually meant to help, for in its enactment it blatantly turns Vermonter against Vermonter, removes self-reliance and puts the Nanny in charge.

Let’s be clear: This is not my idea of freedom, nor of unity in my beloved home State — not when my neighbor becomes suspect enemy #1. 

Nope. Not my State.

Cootie Status

This weekend brought me face to face with the new ‘cootie culture’ nightmare I thought I had left behind me, in my long ago childhood.

Memories of being in sixth grade and the recipient of the traumatizing, bullying ‘cootie catcher’ game (using the origami folded ‘cootie catcher’, if you’ll recall) came rushing back, and I found myself experiencing those familiar feelings of rejection, for not being accepted for who I am, and sadly, I suspect, a game which 12-year-olds still, routinely inflict on the kid who challenges the status quo. Certainly, no one I’ve mentioned this comparison to doesn’t know what I am referring to. There are even directions online on how to build one, with no different at all from the one I was familiar with in sixth grade as well. 

I wondered, astonished, if people still believed ‘cooties’ could hide in the folds of ‘cootie catcher’ still, but then thought, “Oh. Wait. They do.”

[In case you don’t remember this awful form of gaslighting, the idea was to come up behind someone and ‘scoop’ up their ‘cooties’ (invisible ‘bugs’ trailing behind) with the ‘cootie catcher,’ and then torture the person with the ‘captured cooties’ either their own, or someone else’s cooties. It became even more confusing (because twelve-year-olds tend to translate literally) when someone ‘caught’ your ‘cooties’ and ‘gave’ them to someone you had a crush on. So there was ‘cootie love’ as well as ‘cootie trashing’, too. And equal opportunity ‘cootie,’ apparently.]

The parallels to the game endemic within our current fear of ‘cooties’ is clear to me.

The ‘cootie culture’ is worrisome for what it invokes in its name.

The admonitions to avoid one another are as dangerous as any ‘cootie’ that leads to a ‘really bad cold’ (that is as dangerous and can kill anyone whose body is compromised by other health issues, as the regular flu can), and the opposite of what humanity needs in any time of crisis. Exactly the opposite. We need one another, for help, for comfort, for soothing, for nurturing each other back to health, and for safety’s sake. Doing without that connection with one another can be deadly.

It is against our natures to separate in times of crisis.

Freedom and unity

Our State motto does not extrapolate to mean to isolate together, separately, nor espouses that somehow this will make us stronger. That would be blatant word salad serving as division, and making us enemies of one another, and ultimately serves to weaken the very heart and souls of our Vermont lives. And, if we have learned anything from our shared histories, separation always exposes the most vulnerable to predation from outside, by pathological, power-hungry people.

But there is a deeper issue at stake here, with more far-reaching affects on our health and even sanity as Vermonters.

Given that part of my past research has dealt with the deep and lasting psychological effects of isolation and lack of human touch on humans (let alone animals who were the first victims of these ‘studies’), alarm bells have been going off willy-nilly since I saw “quarantine” and “medical martial law” coming down the pike since January when the first cases of this ‘really bad cold’ were announced in China. 

Mass isolation rips into a critical fabric at the heart and soul of community infrastructure in Vermont’s rural outreach, and makes the most vulnerable targets for abuse, even if that comes in the form of social shunning.

For small businesses, or even the most vulnerable elderly populations, forced isolation removes protections Vermont communities have created, and allows a gap through which the predators can enter and pitch small business ‘gap’ loans, ostensibly to help bridge a time of need, but which inevitably turns into a transaction, and boom! Debt is incurred through a ‘benevolent’ contract that actually undermines a Vermonter’s future, with indentured servitude where, maybe, none existed before, serving the vested interests of banks through the interest charged, that desperation led Vermonter’s to agree to pay ‘just to get through.’

Thus, entrapped, we have failed to save ourselves and trusted some vague entity outside ourselves to fix a problem, that profits enormously off our misery (disaster capitalism), and in doing so, undermines our right to choose our futures, not the least of which is our inalienable right to save ourselves, or not.

Focused on ‘being ill,’ too many residents have forgotten what it means to live, and to be alive here in Vermont: Connecting with nature, fishing, playing in a tree, swimming in a pond or river, or skating atop its frozen ice, or sliding down a slippery slope on sophisticated barrel staves, or laying in a field at night looking at the stars, or coming together around a kitchen table for tea and company, or wine and song, or a game of Scrabble or whist — we have forgotten why we and how we meant to live here. 

There are also known consequences of people forced to isolate and ‘shelter in place’: domestic violence, babies in nine months, herd immunity, unemployment, dissolution of businesses, repossessions of homes, cars, toys, and predatory loans, rebellion, and autocratic regimes settling in for the long haul, now that the goal has been tested and found worthy: they will comply.

And the stories of our lives are being silenced with no one to hear them, and in that silencing is the death knell of our culture, a fate that more than one culture preceding this one, has faced.

The most important part of being human right now, and always, is to show up for on another, especially for those elders, the carriers of our wisdom, who are quietly living and dying alone, in assisted living or nursing homes, and too rarely independent.

How does all of this affect Vermonter’s humanity in the long run, and our long-forged relationships with one another, over time? How does one substitute the act loving one another? 

Why is the one thing we need most in a crisis, each other, the one thing that is verboten, shamed and gaslighted,?

I call all this into question for the sake of our humanity, going forward. Faced with a choice of being compliant or human, I hope we choose humanity, and compassion in action. No one should choose now to abandon someone who relies on them for an essential access to things like grocery shopping, doctor’s appointments, or even weekly social contacts. 

And when we are together, for gawd’s sake, lets not treat each other as if we have ‘cooties.’ There is no upside to that treatment, and no human way to feel good about being shunned and marginalized. We need to rethink this approach, and realize that we live together, and we die together. If we abandon and isolate one another now, we are signing our own death warrants.

United we stand, divided we fall. Believe it, or not.

Contributed by fellow Vermonter Allison Teague. Cross-posted from MEDIUM.